Gaming & Culture —

Activision may be eyeing drums, vocals for Guitar Hero IV

Activision may be looking to expand its Guitar Hero series into other …

Some news you get and you hope it isn't true; I don't know many people who would want to keep two sets of drum sets for their video games in their house. Once things start getting two sources deep, however, they're firmly in rumor territory. IGN is reporting that, in Conde Nast Portfolio magazine, Activision President Bobby Kotick was quoted as saying more instruments may be coming to Guitar Hero IV, oranother as-yet unnamed title.

"It's not just about guitars," Kotick says. "We'll include a lot of other instruments, vocals. It will help us expand internationally. It's the first game we've had in which we can use local content and local bands."

Sigh. For the market, it was actually nice to have a game that was simply guitars, and it seemed like many people preferred Guitar Hero for just that reason. If this happens, and Guitar Hero IV turns into aRock Band imitator, we'll end up with two products on the market apparently trying to do the exact same thing. It takes time to code songs for drums and vocals, and I'd much rather Activision and Neversoft spent that time adding more features and modes and songs for the guitars.

Not to mention such a game would most likely ship with new guitars, and of course the drums. Since Activision doesn't like to play nice with others, locking out the compatibility between this game and Rock Band could potentially mean fans of the genre would have two sets of drums, four guitars, and two microphones. Are we having fun yet?

Admittedly, this is much speculation over one little quote. For the record though, we don't like where this is going. Also, let's not forget about the DJ Hero trademark. Let's pray Guitar Hero presents Band Hero: Limp Bizkit Version isn't in our future. Of course, with such fine merchandise as the above keychain that Mike found yesterday, anything is possible.

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